Christmas Is Coming Around Again
by Fanpire101
Summary: "Two brothers not speaking for two years now, can't even remember what they're fighting about. Might be the snow falling, or the glow of those lights. They both say 'I'm sorry', and up talking all night."-Scotty McCreery. Sam's second Stanford Christmas wouldn't be the same without his big brother showing up for a visit.


**A/N** :Hi everyone! This is my first foray into the world of Supernatural fanfiction, so please be kind! I just love the relationship between the brothers, and can't get that Stanford fight out of my head, even 11 seasons later. So here's what I came up with, mixed with a little Christmas spirit. This fic was inspired by the Scotty McCreery song of the same name, as well as that one line from the pilot, about how Dean hasn't really spoken to Sam in two years. That leaves two years unaccounted for, which is where this fic sits in the timeline. I really hope you enjoy it, and would love to hear what you have to say. Special thanks to RaisingAmara for giving it a once over, and Sasha Snape for being the best sounding board a writer could ask for. So please, read and review and enjoy!

 **Disclaimer:** Nothing recognizable belongs to me. The Winchesters belong to Eric Kripke and Co, and the CW. There is a place called Zane's Tavern in Aspen, Colorado but I've never been there, so I can only hope that I've done it justice.

* * *

Christmas Is Coming Around Again

 _Two brothers not speaking, for two years now,_

 _Can't even remember what they're fighting about._

 _Might be the snow falling, or the glow of those lights._

 _They both say "I'm sorry,"_

 _End up talking all night._

 _Hallelujah, there's forgiveness in the wind,_

 _Hallelujah, it's time to let go and let the love in_

 _Christmas is coming around again_

 _-Scotty McCreery, "Christmas Is Coming Around Again"_

* * *

Two years. Two years since his entire world had been turned upside down, ripped inside out, and had all the stuffing shaken out of it. It had taken months to get his head on straight and, yeah, some of that was his fault, but he wasn't the one who never called, never wrote, never even sent friggin' smoke signals. He had called, emailed, sent letters, postcards, the works! Never any response. He had dedicated 22 years of his life to that kid, and all that earned him was a crumpled up note on his pillow. Fan-freaking-tastic…

* * *

 _Dean Winchester hated playing referee for his dad and baby brother. Honestly, sometimes the rare night spent in jail was a blessing, since he usually had a cell to himself and didn't have to fight anyone's battles but his own. He would get 8-12 hours of solace before his dad would come and bail him out, berate him, and the cycle would start over. But, like most of the crap in his life, he did what he had to in order to keep his family together. And that meant defending his egghead brother to within an inch of his life._

 _Dean winced as a glass shattered against the wall._

" _An' where in the hell do you get the right to just up and leave your family, Samuel? After everything I've taught you, after all the shit we've been through together, you decide you're too good for us? I thought I raised you better than that, boy!" John roared._

" _Cut the crap, Dad! You've taught me jack, unless you count a near encyclopedic knowledge of every single freaking thing that goes bump in the night! And you sure as hell didn't raise me! You were too busy off fighting whatever spirit or demon or werewolf that crossed your path!" Sam shouted back, standing as close to John as he could get without being within hitting distance._

 _Dean sat in the springy and worn arm chair that sat in between the two, face buried in his hands. He had known this argument would come when he found the Stanford acceptance letter tucked into an old copy of_ The Hobbit _that he had nicked years ago for Sam from a public library in Seattle. Had he felt betrayed that Sam hadn't told him? You bet your ass he did. Was he proud of his baby brother? Hell yeah. Did he wish he was stuck in some drafty jail cell rather than sitting in between the only two people on Earth he actually gave a damn about, listening to the two of them tear each other to shreds? …Yeah. Yeah, he did. But as much as he wanted to leave, he knew he couldn't—wouldn't—leave Sam to fight this one on his own. Sam was his kid brother, and he would go to the ends of the Earth and back to make him smile. That's how it had been ever since his mom had sat him down and told him that he was going to become Big Brother Dean. So, as much as it tore a hole in his chest bigger than any ghoul, werewolf, or Hellhound could ever manage, Dean would fight tooth and nail against their father so that Sam could go to college._

" _So what, Sam? You're gonna go off, live a normal life, and ignore everything that's going on around you? You gonna become one of those ignorant sons of bitches that we always have to save? Well you know what? If you want a life without your family, fine! You want to go, then go! But if you walk out that door, don't you ever come back!"_

 _Dean stood on shaky legs as Sam stumbled back a step. "Dad, you need to calm down," he murmured, carefully placing himself between Sam and John. "Sammy, go cool off in our room." Sam opened his mouth to protest, but was stopped in his tracks by the look on Dean's face. "I got this, Sammy."_

 _John shook off Dean's restraining hand and grabbed the bottle of whiskey from the coffee table, taking a swig as Sam retreated._

" _You've got this," John muttered under his breath. "You need to stop coddling him, Dean. It's time that he grow up and finally wrap his head around this. We hunt monsters. We help people. That's what our family does. If he doesn't want to do that, then he doesn't have to be part of this family."_

" _I never asked to fight—" Sam started back into the room, but Dean shoved him back with a single hand._

 _John drained the rest of the bottle, which was a considerable amount, before pointing a slightly shaking finger at his eldest boy. "You know what? I got an idea. I'll let him go, if you say that it's what you want."_

 _Dean stared back at his father, unsure of who he was for the first time in his life. John Winchester was a lot of things. Daddy, Dad, Corporal, drill-sergeant, superhero, hunter, obsessive-compulsive, but not cruel. Never cruel. "Dad, you're drunk," Dean whispered, hating the desperation that was seeping into his voice._

" _Dean?"_

 _God damn his kid brother who, despite having recently turned 18, could still sound like the innocent four year old who would cuddle up to him in bed when he had a nightmare._

" _Of course I want you to go to college, Geek Boy," Dean answered softly, not trusting himself to look at Sam as he uttered those words, knowing Sam would see the truth written as plain as day across his face._

" _So you want him to leave, huh? You want him to rip this family apart, Dean?"_

" _Of course not! Of course I don't want him to go but—"_

" _But…Dean, you just said…"_

" _Sammy, you deserve to go to college! You worked hard, y'egghead!"_

" _So what happens when we go on a hunt and we're one man short? One of us gets injured because one of our men is AWOL, what happens then?"_

" _That's not gonna happen, Dad, and you—"_

" _You always leave me behind in the motel anyway—"_

 _The questions blended together until, for the first time in his life, Dean couldn't take it. That self-preservational instinct, suppressed by 22 years of placing himself on the frontlines of the battle to defend Sam, kicked in. He reached over and grabbed one of the cheap glasses they had picked up, throwing it harder than he thought possible against a wall._

" _Shut up! Both of you, just SHUT UP!" Deadly silence echoed across the room as Dean sank back into his chair, not even wincing as one of the springs poked him in the back. "I can't keep doing this," he murmured. "Either the two of you are gonna kill each other, or you're both gonna kill me. Either way…" Dean trailed off as his anger left him completely, leaving him a sagging heap in the armchair._

 _He was so tired of being the strong one; tired of being the one who was pulled in two different directions by the two people he loved most. Sam would never understand why he always followed Dad's orders, and that was the way Dean wanted it. He didn't know if he would be able to bear the knowledge that Sam knew how many times he, personally, had failed at protecting his kid brother. When Dean didn't follow John's orders, Sam got hurt. It was simple math._

 _But Dad wouldn't understand why Dean_ had _to protect Sammy. It was more than the bond of two soldiers on the frontlines of the war against the evilest things on the planet. It was more than the bond of two brothers, connected only by shared DNA. It was the heat of those flames, still burning in his heart and soul after 18 years. It was the way Sam had looked up at him that night, not even crying, as if he knew that Dean would protect him no matter what. It was the feeling of his mother's stomach moving underneath his hand for the first time, paired with the exclamation of "_ He knows who his big brother is! _" It was the knowledge that he had been there for every first, even before the fire. Dad had missed a few, but Dean was always there. Hell, the fact that the kid's first word was a garbled version of his name spoke volumes. Theirs was a bond forged of more than blood, sweat, and tears; it was a bond of firsts and lasts, a bond of natural instinct. And for that, Dean was always, and would always, be there. Except for now._

 _Calmly, very calmly, he reached back and picked up his leather jacket from where he had deposited it over the back of the armchair. Pulling it on as though in a dream, he pulled his car keys out of his pocket (thank God Dad had gifted Baby to him on his 18_ _th_ _birthday) and stepped out onto the porch of the dilapidated old house they had been calling home for the past three months while they had been working a werewolf case and Sam had been finishing off his senior year._

 _Dean slammed the car door a little harder than necessary and offered a silent apology to the Impala as he started the engine, knowing that he shouldn't be taking his anger out on her, the only girl who had never let him down._

 _Three hours later Dean returned to the house, $127 richer, 50% calmer, and a hell of a lot drunker than he had been before he left._

 _Making his way up the front steps without stumbling was a feat that he congratulated himself on upon completion, and he entered the drafty house with a tiny wince at the creak that rang out when the door opened._

 _John was passed out on the couch with a second empty bottle when he entered what was supposed to pass for the family room. Dean grabbed the knit blanket (a gift from a hippy witch doctor from years ago) and draped it over his father, using his light fingered touch to pull the empty whiskey bottle from his hands._

 _His next stop was the room that he shared with Sam. Dean looked over at the lump in his brother's bed and grinned ruefully, shaking his head._

" _I'm sorry, Sammy," he whispered into the night air, hoping that his baby brother was only feigning sleep. "I know you need to go to school. Hell, I wouldn't have worked so many extra hours at the garage to help pay for those SAT Prep courses you wanted to take if I thought it wasn't worth it, that you weren't worth it. But damn it all to Hell if I'm not gonna miss you, Little Brother. And don't worry about Dad. I can handle him. Forget what he said about leaving and not coming back—" Dean paused to yawn. "You're my kid as much as you are his, and I say you can come back whenever you damn well please."_

 _Dean knew that if he wasn't so drunk then he wouldn't have said anything at all. If he hadn't been so drunk, then he also would have registered that the steady sound of Sam's breathing—the only lullaby he had needed since Hey Jude had started causing more harm than good—was absent from the room._

 _He woke early that morning. Once the alcohol had worn off, he had registered the fact that he couldn't hear anything coming from the second bed in the room, and had rocketed out of bed faster than he had ever moved before. Tearing off the blankets on Sam's bed, Dean cursed loudly when he saw the pillows stacked in a form that could resemble Sam in the dark. Sam's backpack and duffle were also gone._

 _Dean felt the darkest and most desperate fear known to man claw its way into his stomach and up his throat. It was a feeling he hadn't had since he was 18 and Sam had disappeared on his watch. Before that it had glommed onto him in a rinky dink bowling themed motel, when the hairs on the back of his neck went up and he saw that supernatural bastard leaning over his kid brother. It was a feeling that only appeared whenever something bad happened to Sam._

 _Dean rocked heavily back on his heels and sat down on his bed, putting his head between his knees and taking deep breaths. Now was not the time to panic. Dean Henry Winchester did not panic. He would pull himself together, wake Dad up, take whatever punishment was thrown at him for letting Sam out of his sight, then they would put their heads together and find him. Just like Flagstaff._

 _Dean lowered himself gently to lay back on his bed, his breathing picking up again as a thought occurred to him. This was the second time Sam had run off. What if they kept bringing him back and he kept rabbiting on them? Hunting and taking care of Sam. Those were the two things that Dean knew how to do, and Sam always came number one. After the Shtriga incident of 1989, Dean knew without any doubt that he would happily place himself between Sam and any danger that could befall him. It was the reason he went to juvie, then to Sonny's boys home when they ran out of money and Sam got hungry. Hell, it was the reason he left Sonny's place and rejoined his family. It was the reason he went hungry most nights when Sam wanted something other than cereal for dinner. It was the reason he purposely mucked up the poltergeist case June 1996 so that Sam could finish the eighth grade like a normal kid. It was the reason he worked extra hours at the garage for crap wages when Sam said that he wanted to take a preparatory class for the SATs, and why he continued working that job when Sam shyly admitted that he wanted to take a girl to prom. It was the reason he slaughtered an entire werewolf pack on his own in Rives, Tennessee and hauled ass back to Bellflower, Missouri, picking up three speeding tickets on his way, when Sam confessed his fear that nobody would be in the audience to watch him graduate from high school. Sure, Dad had been pissed that he went off half-cocked on his own, but who the hell cared? The smile on his kid brother's face had been worth the court hearing, the verbal lashing from his father, and the double overtime he worked at a factory in Chicago to pay off his debt. Everything he did, he did for that stupid kid of his. There was no Dean without Sam, and Dean didn't know what he would do if Sam was so insistent upon leaving him behind. It went against every fiber of his being to make the kid unhappy, but there was a point where self-preservation would win out and he would try to make Sam stay, for his own sanity._

 _Dean grabbed his other pillow and pulled it over his face, half hoping the house was haunted and that whatever vengeful spirit was out there would try to smother him so that he wouldn't have to face the thought that, perhaps, he didn't mean as much to his brother as his brother meant to him._

 _Something light and rough hit Dean's arm as he threw his arm over the pillow to hold it in place. Dean threw the pillow off and picked up the piece of paper that had just landed on the mattress._

"I had to. I'm sorry – Sam."

* * *

Dean chuckled morosely as he lifted the beer bottle to his lips and took a long slurp of the amber liquid within. That had been two years ago. Dean hadn't even been worth a damn postcard saying that the kid had made it to California alright. If Dean hadn't called Stanford's administration posing ( _or maybe not so much_ ) as a concerned parent ( _yeah, definitely not faking_ ) and asked whether the student Sam Winchester had arrived safely, then he wouldn't have even known that the kid was alive and not dead in a ditch somewhere.

Two years without a word, and yet here he was, sitting in some dive bar in Colorado, where Sam had said he would meet him.

Dean had been making a point of taking a case near Stanford every couple of weeks, just to do a drive-by check up on Sam. Normally, he'd sit in the Impala outside of the campus bookstore and wait, sometimes all day, for a glimpse of his baby brother. Usually he got lucky, and was able to spot him amongst the other Brainiac students milling about. A few months ago, on a whim (a completely drunken whim), he followed Sam all the way to his dorm, and slipped a note into his mailbox, asking him to meet him over his Christmas break wherever he could. In his gin-soaked mind (he hadn't even been drinking the good stuff), it was the least Sam could do after leaving him high and dry. Besides, Dean wasn't exactly itching to spend another Christmas on his own. So when word had come via a voicemail from Bobby, saying that Sam was spending Christmas in Aspen, Colorado with his girlfriend's family and would meet him the day before Christmas Eve at some place called Zane's Tavern, Dean had immediately agreed.

"Do you want something to eat with that beer, or are you just looking to get drunk?" The blond waitress asked, coming by his table for the third time since he sat down.

"He'll have the cheeseburger, thanks Patti." Dean jerked at the familiar, yet not-so-familiar voice coming from behind him. He closed his eyes for a moment to compose himself, and when he opened them the waitress was still there, looking at him for confirmation.

"Yeah, the cheeseburger please." With a wink and a nod, she turned and disappeared into the back.

Dean hauled himself to his feet and turned to look—up—at his little brother.

"Hey Dean," Sam greeted him softly, as though he was unsure of where the two of them stood with each other.

"Hiya Sammy," Dean replied, even softer than Sam had spoken. Dean cleared his throat and heaved his bravado back into place. "God, look at you man! You're like the Jolly Green Giant or something!" Dean reached up and placed his hands on his brother's shoulders, shaking him once to make sure that, indeed, this was his baby brother standing in front of him.

Sam grinned ruefully and shook off his hands. "You want me to sit down before you hurt your neck, Old Man?"

"Shaddup," Dean grumbled as he took his seat, smiling softly at how the two of them had so quickly fallen back into the same old patterns.

Sam shook his head thoughtfully as he sat down across from him. "It's good to see you, Dean. I mean it, man. I couldn't believe it when I got your note."

"Yeah, well," Dean shrugged. "I figured it was time we caught up. Two years is a long time."

"I know, and I'm so sorry about the way we left things. I wish I could—"

"Forget it, Sam. It doesn't matter now." Sam looked like he wanted to protest, but knew the look on his big brother's face well enough not to press the issue.

"So how did you manage to slip this past Dad?" Sam asked as the waitress returned with a beer for each of them.

Dean smirked as he took a long pull from his beer. "Didn't have to. Haven't seen Dad in 6 weeks." Dean chuckled at the stunned look on Sam's face. "After you left the two of us went our separate ways. Figured we'd cover more ground, save more people, if we both flew solo." Dean decided not to mention that the decision came after a month of Dean not even being able to look his father in the eye. Every time he tried, all he could hear was the last thing John had said to Sam. " _If you walk out that door, don't you ever come back_." Dean got sloppy, and John could see why. Dean was only on the top of his game when he knew what he was fighting for: Sam, waiting for him back at the motel. Without Sam, Dean was reckless, careless, and completely out of control. John, seeing that his presence only made things worse, got the hell out of dodge as soon as he could.

Things had gotten better as the time had passed, but Dean still couldn't stand to be in his father's presence for more than a couple of days, blaming him for the forced separation from Sam. In Dean's mind, if John had just kept his cool and let Sam go off to college, and not threatened him with disownment, things would be fine. His family would still be together. He wouldn't have to go out of his way to make sure Sam was alright. They would be having Christmas together, rather than Dean having to track Sam down on his Christmas break just to get a beer with his baby brother. All of the pent up rage coursed through him and made Dean set his beer bottle down a little harder than necessary, causing some of the amber liquid to slosh out.

Sam jerked a little at the sudden movement, but stayed quiet, opting instead to take in his big brother. Dean was different. He was broader, more muscly, than he had been before he left, but it was more than that. He was…sadder. More…interior. Sam could still see the spark of the old Dean, the one who would goof off and break the rules just to illicit a smile or giggle from Sam, but it was as though that spark had been shuttered, hidden from sight so as to not waste it on the wrong person.

The thought saddened him. He gently set his own bottle down and stared at the linoleum-lined table they sat at.

Sam didn't know where to start. He had hated leaving the way he did, but knew that having to say goodbye to the single most important person in his life would cause him to change his mind. Leaving Dean had hurt like a bitch, but Sam had felt like it was something that he needed to do. He _needed_ to get out there on his own. He _needed_ to try to live a normal, run-of-the-mill life. He _needed_ to do something more than hunt.

He had never stopped to think about what _Dean_ needed. Dean, who had sacrificed the last bowl of Lucky Charms just because he wanted it. Dean, who had stayed up for three nights straight when he was 14 because 10 year old Sammy had caught the flu and Dad wasn't around to take care of him. Dean, who had caught that very same flu from his baby brother, but still managed to cook, clean, make lunches, and make sure Sam got to school on time because that was his job. Dean, who had never asked for anything in return, only hoping that his actions were enough to keep his family together.

Sam knew that his leaving was akin to the most ultimate betrayal in Dean's book, which was why he had never tried to contact Dean after he escaped in the middle of the night. He never knew—and still didn't know—what he could possibly say to make that hurt go away.

Sam absentmindedly scratched at the label of his beer bottle as he pondered what he could say next. " _Sorry_ ," wouldn't cut it, plus Dean would probably smack him if the conversation got too close to 'chick-flick' territory.

"Here you go," Patti the Waitress interrupted the uncomfortable silence that was growing steadily in between the two brothers, sliding Dean's cheeseburger in front of him. "You want anything, Sam?"

Sam kept his eyes trained on the fake wooden table as he sucked in a shaky breath, closed his eyes in an attempt to quell the tears that he knew would only make Dean feel guilty, and shook his head no. Patti and the staff at Zane's couldn't give him what he wanted, not really. He wished with all his heart that things could go back to normal. Big Brother Dean, always there to soothe the fevers and the nightmares and take care of him. He had never wanted for a mother or a father, so long as he had his hero in the motel bed next to him. The desire to have that connection returned to him was like a big, dark, sucking mass inside of him. Being here, in front of Dean, made all of the emotions from those first few lonely months at school rise to the forefront of his mind. The desire to be normal mixed with the absolute fear of letting go of the only person he'd ever fully trusted. The absolute joy in finally doing something that _he_ wanted tangled up with the knowledge that his independence had cost the happiness of the person who had sacrificed everything _they_ had ever wanted, for him. The pleasure of having friends who he wouldn't have to leave after a few weeks, and the knee-jerk response of "Only my brother calls me Sammy" whenever he felt those ties of friendship getting too strong. The previous Christmas, his first since leaving for Stanford, when he resolved to spend the night at some crap campus bar because the few friends he had made had gone home for the holidays, and he had willingly left his family. If his savior, in the form of a certain Jessica Lee Moore, hadn't shown up at that very bar because her flight to Colorado for her family's annual Christmas ski vacation had been cancelled due to bad weather, he probably wouldn't have made it to the end of the semester. He would have caved, called Dean, and gone home, damning the consequences. He truly would have crashed and burned without her, just as he had been crashing and burning without Dean.

Maybe it was because Dean had spoiled him as best he could as a child, but damn it if Sam didn't want both. He wanted Jess _and_ Dean, Stanford _and_ the Impala. But Dad had taken that choice away from him. He could never go home.

"Dean…I—" Sam fought the closing of his throat and put up his hand as Dean opened his mouth to interrupt. "Please," he whispered, hating the desperation in his voice. "I need to say this." Sam looked up into his brother's eyes, hating the hidden pain that was radiating from them. Dean could fool a lot of people. Hell, he could probably fool the entire population of the planet if he set his mind to it. But he could never fool Sam. "I'm so, so sorry about the way I left. I can only imagine how you must have felt. But you were right. Me and Dad, always fighting. It was killing you. I couldn't keep putting you through that, just like I couldn't bring myself to say goodbye. But you have to know that it wasn't about you. I didn't leave you, or, at least, I didn't want to leave you. And I never called because I never figured out what to say. I still don't know what to say to make you understand, to maybe get you to for—" Sam's breath hitched as he struggled to keep his emotions in check. "Maybe get you to forgive me," he mumbled.

"Sammy," Dean groaned, digging the heel of one of his hands into the space between his eyebrows. In that moment, Dean looked 74, not 24. The weight that he carried made his shoulders sag and his spine bend. When he looked up, the full magnitude of the pain Dean had been carrying with him for the past two years, maybe even longer, was unleashed upon his brother in a single look that made Sam want to cry. A single blink later, the look was gone and replaced with one of concern and understanding. Dean reached across the table and placed his hand gently on Sam's arm, squeezing slightly. "It's okay…We're okay." Sam sucked in a deep breath, feeling as though he was breathing for the first time in two years. Dean slapped his arm and dug into his burger, groaning obscenely at the taste of it. "Now enough chick flick crap!" Dean exclaimed as best he could with his mouth full. Dean swallowed and took a swig of his beer. "Now tell me about this girlfriend o'yours! Is she hot?"

Sam chuckled ruefully. "You're such a jerk."

"And you're a little bitch! Now talk, College Boy!" The response was instant and habitual, a ritual that spoke volumes to both. Sam sighed in relief before launching into a full-blown description of Jess: what she looked like, what she smelled like, how her voice sounded, how they met, and about a million other details that Dean honestly couldn't have cared less about. What mattered to him was the glint in his baby brother's eyes, the smile that never left his face, and the very fact that he was talking to him as though no time had passed.

Hours went by with the two brothers sitting inside that dingy little bar, snow falling outside. They spoke about everything and nothing at all. Dean had Sam laughing until he cried, and Sam had Dean nearly choking on his beer at some of the Joe College stories he had to tell. To an outsider looking in, they looked like a regular couple of bros having a beer like any other Friday night. But to the Winchester boys, this was a night that would get Sam through finals, through his crap summer job, and through the next two years of his life. It would get Dean through a major concussion, appendicitis, massive blood loss, broken bones, collapsed lungs, broken hearts, and basically every damned day of his life when his baby brother wasn't by his side. The mere knowledge that they both had this memory of the normalcy that Sam so craved, mixed so perfectly with the past that Dean so treasured would get them through all of the trials and tribulations they would face, both together and separately.

It was around two AM when Patti Moore the Waitress (and cousin to the Saintly Jessica) was finally able to kick the two brothers out so she could clean up and go home.

The two stopped next to their cars, the black 1967 Chevy Impala white with snow and the 2001 Chevy Silverado rental that Sam was driving sitting next to it. In Dean's mind it was a telling image. The old classic car that carried so much history, sitting next to the relatively new truck that belonged in that winter landscape, belonged in a newer, safer world. Two cars that, though made by the same company, didn't seem like they would belonged together, yet completed each other nonetheless.

The wind blew around the two boys as both searched for something to say that would make this parting easier than the last one.

"Well, see ya around, Sammy," Dean said, wrapping his arms around his brother before he could second guess himself. He closed his eyes as he clapped his baby brother on the back a few times, squeezing his kid tighter at the thought of what he was about to do.

"Yeah, let's try to make sure it's not another two years, okay?" Sam replied, wrapping his arms around his brother's shoulders, secretly not wanting to let go because he felt in his gut what his big brother was about to do.

Dean pulled back first and held him at arm's length. He smiled that cocky smile of his before smacking him on his shoulders and taking a step back towards the Impala. "For sure, baby bro."

Sam smiled sadly as Dean got into his precious car and started the engine. The purr reminded Sam of better days, when he was never more than a room away from his older brother.

"Hey Sammy?" Sam put his hand on the hood of the Impala and lowered his head to peer through the open driver's side window. Dean seemed to hesitate for a few seconds before grinning genuinely at him. "I'm proud o'you."

Sam rocked back on his heels as Dean did up the window again to prevent any more snow from drifting in. He could count on one hand how many times anyone in his family had told him they were proud of him, and most (if not all) of those compliments had come from Dean. Sam felt a smile creep onto his face at the notion that maybe, just maybe, Dean understood, and had forgiven him for leaving.

Sam waved as Dean pulled out of the parking lot, knowing that he wouldn't be seeing him for a while. They probably wouldn't see each other for years. Of course, Dean would still go to Stanford and check in on him, just as Sam knew he had been doing for the past two years, ( _Roll a classic car like that onto a campus filled with fraternity brothers who would kill for such a ride, and sorority sisters who would kill for the dreamy green eyed guy who drove her, and gossip would spread_.) but he wouldn't make contact. Because Dean was a creature of habit. Same beer, same meal, same car, same music, same protective instinct. Dean saw that Sam was safe, and, even more than that, that he belonged at Stanford.

Dean would always lay his life on the line for Sam, but part of being a big brother was to ensure that the baby of the family was happy, not just healthy. So Dean would leave him alone, let him go on with his 'Apple Pie' life. He would do that until his self-preservation kicked in again. Maybe the radio silence would last a year, maybe two. But Dean would rather be miserable himself than risk Sam being even the slightest bit upset.

" _Always sacrificing himself for me_ ," Sam thought sadly as he climbed into his truck. It's what was, and what would always be, Dean's most important personality trait. Thinking back to that Christmas years ago, when Bobby had given him that ugly little amulet to give to his father, paired with the words "Give it to the person who is most important to you", he knew that Dean was that person, and that he had been sacrificing everything for him since before he even recognized it. Though Sam hated that his happiness had to come at the expense of his brother's, he knew that it was Dean's gift to him. Like everything else the Winchester's had, it wasn't shiny or gift wrapped and placed under the tree, but it was given with more care and devotion than any of the trinkets that were waiting for him under the tree at the ski lodge.

So, to Sam, it didn't really matter that they were spending Christmas apart. They had already exchanged their gifts.

* * *

 **A/N:** Thanks for reading! Please, please, please let me know what you think!


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